Indigenous marketing practices and theories in emerging economies: Consumer behavior and retail transformations in India

Large emerging economies like India present major challenges to international marketers as well as to academic theorists. The retail sector in India is particularly challenging because, numerically, it is the world's largest and most heterogeneous, with millions of tiny small traditional outlets competing with thousands of rapidly growing and expanding modern retail chain outlets. Based on extensive fieldwork in India entailing observation, interviews and secondary research, this paper presents a multifaceted view of how consumer patronage of small traditional stores provide competitive advantages to these small competitors. The empirical results suggest historical patterns do not apply in this context. Managerial and theoretical implications follow. The working conclusion is that retail developments in India and other major emerging economies would require not just innovations in practice but strong, ongoing efforts for theoretical renewal so that better explanatory frameworks are available for understanding marketing strategies and consumer behaviors in emerging settings.